What is this sermon about?
In Ruth 2:1–13, Ruth goes out to gather leftover grain, not knowing whose field she is walking into. The narrator tells us first: it belongs to Boaz, a relative of Naomi’s late husband. Then comes one of the most loaded lines in the book, “she happened to come” to that exact field. What looks like blind luck to Ruth is God quietly providing, and Boaz responds with practical protection and a blessing.
- Look for the weaving, not only the miracle.In a season of uncertainty, God may be at work through ordinary events that keep lining up.
- Kindness has to become action.Boaz did not only wish Ruth well or promise to pray. He made specific plans to protect and provide for her.
Ruth 2:1–13 explained
Who was Boaz in the Bible?
Boaz was a landowner in Bethlehem and a relative of Elimelech, the late husband of Naomi. The passage calls him “a man of great wealth.” Pastor Tim explains that the Hebrew word is the same one used for mighty men of valor elsewhere in the Old Testament, so it describes more than money. At this point in the story the word for “relative” is a general one. He is family, but he has not yet been named as the family’s redeemer. That comes later.
What does “she happened to come” mean in Ruth 2:3?
The Hebrew doubles the word for chance, something like “her happening happened upon” the part of the field belonging to Boaz. Hebrew repeats words for emphasis. To Ruth it looked like luck: she saw a field and went to work. The reader already knows whose field it is. The author is showing that what looks like coincidence is God’s provision.
Why are there no miracles in the book of Ruth?
No one in Ruth is healed or raised from the dead. Pastor Tim’s point is that God is still moving all through the story. The “coincidences” keep stacking up: the famine ends, Ruth picks a field, the field belongs to a relative, and he arrives that same day. The absence of a dramatic miracle does not mean God is absent.
How did Boaz protect Ruth?
A poor, unmarried foreign woman gleaning alone during the lawless time of the Judges was exposed to harassment or worse. Boaz told Ruth to stay in his field and close to his young women, where there was safety in numbers. He ordered his young men not to touch her. He gave her access to the water his workers had drawn. Pastor Tim calls this specific, practical protection, not abstract niceness.
How is Ruth like Abraham?
Boaz says Ruth left her father and mother and the land of her birth to come to a people she did not know. That closely echoes God’s call to Abraham in Genesis 12:1 to leave his country and his family. Many commentators read it as a deliberate echo. Boaz is describing a widow from Moab in the same terms as the father of Israel’s faith. Like Abraham, she acted by faith.
What does “under whose wings” mean in Ruth 2:12?
The Hebrew word for “wings” is kanaph, the same word used in Malachi 4:2 for healing “in His wings.” It is the Old Testament’s standard picture of God’s protecting care, like a mother bird hiding her chicks. Boaz is praying that God Himself, not Boaz, would be Ruth’s shelter.
What does “spoken kindly” mean in Ruth 2:13?
Literally, it is “spoken to the heart.” It is an expression for tender, reassuring words that calm fear. The same phrase is used when Joseph comforts his frightened brothers in Genesis 50, and when God promises in Hosea 2:14 to win back unfaithful Israel. The words Boaz used to comfort a frightened foreign widow are the words the prophets use for God’s own pursuit of His people.
Questions for reflection and discussion
Use these on your own as a devotional, with your family, or in a small group. You do not need to have heard the sermon to use them. Reading Ruth 2:1–13 first will help.
- Ruth “happened” to come to Boaz’s field. Looking back, where has something that seemed like chance turned out to be God’s provision in your life?
- Are you waiting for a big sign from God right now? What smaller evidence of His care might you be overlooking?
- Boaz greeted his workers with a blessing in a culture that had drifted from God. What would it look like for your home or workplace to run differently from the culture around it?
- Boaz gave Ruth specific, practical protection. Who do you know in a vulnerable position, and what is one concrete thing you could do for them?
- Ruth asked, “Why have I found favor in your eyes?” When has someone’s kindness surprised you? How did it change you?
Related resources
Sermon transcript
This transcript has been lightly edited so it is easier to read. Scripture readings are noted in brackets. You can read Ruth 2:1–13 here and follow along.
She Happened to Come: full transcript
Introduction 29:50
Let’s go to the book of Ruth. If you are new here, I am what is called an expository preacher. That is a fancy term that means I go book by book instead of preaching on topics. We go chapter by chapter, verse by verse, sometimes line by line and even word for word.
The story so far 30:10
We just finished chapter 1. There we learned about a woman named Naomi, married to Elimelech, with two sons. They go to Moab because there is a great famine in Israel. Moab is a neighboring country that was not always kind to Israelites, but they go, and they stay at least ten years. The two sons marry. Then all the men die. Naomi is now a widow who has also lost both her children, and she is left with two daughters-in-law, Orpah and Ruth.
She tells them, “I have nothing for you. I cannot give you more sons to marry. But there is still a chance for you. Go back home to your families and to your gods.” Orpah does not want to. She is crying. But she goes home, which was culturally acceptable. Why? Because there was no Social Security. There was nothing to take care of these women except going back to family or finding a new husband. There was nothing wrong with what Orpah did.
Ruth, the Scripture says, clung to Naomi. That word is almost like the clinging of marriage, when two become one, joined together, nearly welded together. Ruth tells Naomi, “I am not leaving. Where you go, I will go. Your God will be my God. Your people will be my people. Where you die, I will die.” Basically, “You are stuck with me.” And Naomi resigns herself to the fact that Ruth is staying. “Fine. It is what it is. We will make it work.”
I will give my disclaimer again: I am going to mix up Naomi and Ruth. In my head they are backwards. The Scriptures are right, and I am wrong.
Reading the passage 33:20
[Pastor Tim reads Ruth 2:1–13 from the New King James Version.]
Now the story starts to take a turn. Let’s go back to verse 1 and see how Boaz is introduced.
Verse 1: we know something Ruth does not 36:40
[Reads Ruth 2:1.]
The first thing I want to point out is that this is a deliberate aside from the narrator. Ruth does not know this yet. We, the readers, get background information before the story unfolds. She is about to walk into this field completely unaware of who owns it. The narrator tips us off first, which builds the anticipation.
You are being let in on something the characters do not know yet. That is exactly where readers of Scripture often find themselves when learning about God’s providence. We get to be Monday morning quarterbacks. We can see what is about to happen and what God has already done. God has already ended the famine. The rain has come, and the food is growing. And there is a man named Boaz, a man of great wealth, who owns the field Ruth is about to walk into. We get that benefit. Ruth does not. As we read, it helps to understand what each person knew, so we can understand why they acted as they did.
A relative, but not yet a redeemer 38:50
What do we know about Boaz? He is a relative from the family of Elimelech. The word here is a general term for a relative or acquaintance. It is not the specific legal term for a kinsman-redeemer, which comes later.
If the kinsman-redeemer is new to you, go to our website, sfb.church. There is a page for this sermon series on Ruth, and on it is a background document you can download with much of what I do not have time to cover each week.
Briefly: there was no Social Security. Women could not go to Walmart and get a job. They were stuck, and they needed help. In the Jewish tradition, that help usually came through family. There was a custom called levirate marriage. If a man died with no heir, and his widow could still have children, she was to marry his brother. Their child would be considered the heir of the man who died, so that the family, the land, and the provision stayed within the family. It was a way of caring for widows when there seemed to be no other way.
We will learn more about that in chapter 3. For now, Boaz is not in that role. He is simply family. It is a piece of information the narrator plants now that will pay off later.
A man of great wealth 41:30
He was a man of great wealth. You might read that and think he is just rich, which is true. But the word here is the same term used in Judges 6 and Judges 11 for mighty men of valor, and for David’s mighty men. He is not just rich. He is mighty. I would say he is not rich. He is wealthy.
Chris Rock used to tell a joke about the difference between rich and wealthy. If you play in the NBA, you are rich. If you sign the checks for NBA players, you are wealthy. Boaz is wealthy. He has land, servants, and family. That word is not something to skim past.
Interestingly, in Ruth 3, Boaz calls Ruth a virtuous woman, and “virtuous” is that same word. He is telling us she is a woman of great worth.
If you want to know more about Boaz, I do not have time to keep talking about him as a character. On that same series page, next to the background download, there is a character study on Boaz. I highly suggest downloading it. It really helps you understand who we are talking about.
Verses 2–3: she happened to come 44:33
[Reads Ruth 2:2–3.]
Here Ruth invokes the gleaning law. When a field was harvested, some of the crop was intentionally left behind, so that travelers, people down on their luck, and widows could come in behind the harvesters and gather enough to live on. It was part of the Jewish law, in Leviticus 19 and Deuteronomy 24.
This is the first time in the book of Ruth that the law is put into practice. And it is by Ruth, a Moabite woman. She is not an Israelite. A foreigner is the one relying on Israel’s built-in provision for the poor, and God still uses it.
Verse 3 says she “happened to come” to the field. This is one of the most theologically loaded moments in the whole book, and it is easy to read right past it in English. The Hebrew uses a doubled construction built on the word for chance. It says something like, “her happening happened upon” the portion of the field belonging to Boaz. It drives the point home. Hebrew uses double and triple repetition for emphasis. That is why we read “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.” He is not just holy, or holier. He is the holiest.
It is dramatic irony. What looks like blind luck to Ruth is God’s provision. She is walking, she sees a field, and she says to Naomi, “Let me go see if I can glean something for you and me.” Naomi says, “Go.” And she just happens to come to this one.
God at work without a miracle 48:45
Here is the interesting thing about the book of Ruth. You do not see one obvious miracle. In the New Testament we read about Jesus healing lepers, making the blind see, the deaf hear, and the lame walk, and we say, “What an incredible miracle.” Then we read Ruth and see no physical miracles at all.
But God is showing us that these coincidences, stacking one on another, are nothing less than His plan moving through the lives of Naomi and Ruth. Just because you do not see the big physical miracle does not mean God is not moving. Elimelech is not raised from the dead the way Lazarus was. God is still moving through the story.
Verses 4–7: “The Lord be with you” 49:50
[Reads Ruth 2:4–7.]
Boaz arrives from Bethlehem and spots her. But notice what he says first: “The Lord be with you.” That is a big detail when you remember the setting. This is the time of the Judges, when everyone did what was right in his own eyes. There was not a lot of goodness going on.
The book of Judges is one big cycle. The people obeyed God, until they didn’t. Then God sent hard times to get their attention. They cried out to Him, and He sent a deliverer. Israel obeyed, until they didn’t. Over and over. People were not focused on what God cared about. They were selfish. “If it is mine, it is mine.”
And here is Boaz, in that time, and the first thing we hear from him is “The Lord be with you.” His very first line in the book is a blessing exchanged with his workers, and it appears to be a daily custom. It does not feel out of place. The man in charge of the harvesters was not shocked to hear it. When Boaz greets his people, he greets them in the Lord.
That signals immediately that Boaz’s household runs differently from the surrounding culture. The culture does what is right in its own eyes. Boaz is focused on what is right in God’s eyes. It is a small detail and easy to skip, but it establishes who Boaz is before we ever see what he does.
The servant’s report 54:05
Boaz asks his servant, “Whose young woman is this?” The servant answers, “She is the young Moabite woman who came back with Naomi from Moab. She asked to glean after the harvesters. She has been working from morning until now, with only a short rest.”
Notice what gets highlighted. The servant is vouching for her character and her work ethic without being asked. He could have said, “That is Ruth from Moab. She came with Naomi,” and that would have been enough. Instead the Scripture goes into detail about how hard she works.
The servant says nothing here about how she cares for Naomi. Yet by verse 11, Boaz knows all about who she is and what she has done. I can see that happening one of two ways. Word may have started in the field while she was gleaning and worked its way up to the man in charge. Or remember chapter 1: when Ruth and Naomi came back to Bethlehem, the whole town recognized Naomi and was stirred. We do not know how word reached Boaz. We only know her reputation was spreading, and God was weaving it through the story.
Verses 8–9: protection, not just provision 57:20
[Reads Ruth 2:8–9.]
Now it is not only provision that comes from gleaning. It is Boaz’s protection. Here is a poor, unmarried, foreign woman gleaning alone in a field during a lawless period. She would have been genuinely vulnerable to harassment or worse.
Boaz’s instructions are not just polite hospitality. He could have said, “It is all right. You can glean and take what you want.” That would have been polite. It would have fulfilled the law and been good in God’s eyes. Boaz does not stop there. He tells her to stay in his field specifically, and close to his own young women. There is safety in numbers and safety in fields he controls. He states plainly that he has already commanded the young men not to touch her. And he offers her the water his workers have drawn, a basic provision that would not otherwise have been open to a foreigner or outsider.
Boaz’s kindness is not abstract niceness. It is specific, practical protection and provision for someone in a truly precarious position. That is what the loyal love we talked about in chapter 1 looks like when it is acted out and not just talked about.
Verse 10: “Why have I found favor?” 60:25
[Reads Ruth 2:10.]
Ruth bows with her face to the ground. That is a posture of deep humility, more than a thank-you. She is genuinely grateful for the protection and the provision, all of it.
Then she asks a question: “Why? I am a foreigner.” She names her status plainly. “I am not one of you. I do not want to trick you into thinking I am an Israelite from Bethlehem. You do not have to show me the grace you would show your own people. Why are you doing this?” As a Moabite woman, she had real reason to expect to be overlooked or worse. I believe Boaz’s kindness genuinely startled her.
Verses 11–12: an echo of Abraham 62:10
[Reads Ruth 2:11–12.]
Boaz says, “You have left your father and your mother and the land of your birth, and have come to a people you did not know before.” That is interesting to me. Where have I heard that before? “Leave the land of your birth and your people, and go to a land that I will show you.” Abraham. It is the same language used at the very beginning of the children of Israel. Abraham is the father of Israel: Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Boaz takes the language God used for Abraham and applies it to Ruth.
Compare Genesis 12:1, where God tells Abraham to leave his country, his family, and his father’s house. The overlap in vocabulary is close enough that many commentators read it as a deliberate echo. The effect is that Boaz quietly casts Ruth, a Moabite widow, in the same light as Abraham, the father of their faith. Her journey of faith is framed in the same language as his.
In the New Testament book of Hebrews, we learn why we can say Abraham is in heaven. By faith Abraham was saved. By faith he obeyed God, left his land, and went to the place God would show him. In the same way, it is by faith that Ruth is there in Boaz’s field, receiving provision and protection. It is all intertwined.
Under whose wings 65:50
Boaz says, “A full reward be given you by the Lord God of Israel, under whose wings you have come for refuge.” The Hebrew word for wings is kanaph. If you were here for Malachi 4:2, the Scripture says there is healing in His wings. It is the same word, which also means the corner of a garment where the tassels begin.
This is the standard Old Testament picture of God’s protective care. It is what birds do. A few months ago I showed you a video of a duck lying on the ground. It looked like a single duck. Then she got up and started walking, and about eight little ducklings ran out from underneath her. You had no idea they were there. Mama was doing a good job of hiding her babies from predators.
That is the picture here. Boaz is telling Ruth, “You have come to Israel. You have come to Yahweh. He is going to cover you with His wings and protect you from those who would take advantage of you or do horrible things to you.”
Boaz is praying that God Himself would be Ruth’s shelter. Not Boaz. Not Boaz’s provision or protection, even though he made plans for both. God Himself.
Verse 13: spoken to the heart 68:15
[Reads Ruth 2:13.]
The phrase “spoken kindly” literally translates “spoken to the heart.” Ruth is saying, “You have spoken to my heart.” It is an expression used elsewhere for tender, reassuring speech that calms fear, as opposed to simply passing along information.
It shows up in a couple of notable places. Joseph speaks this way when he comforts his terrified brothers after their father’s death in Genesis 50. And, remarkably, God uses it in Hosea 2:14, when He promises to woo unfaithful Israel back and speak tenderly to win her heart. The language Boaz uses to comfort a frightened, vulnerable, foreign widow is the language the prophets use for God’s own tender pursuit of His people.
What does this mean for us? 70:00
We do not have time to go further in the chapter, so let me ask: what is the point? This is a great story. It would make a great movie, and there have been a couple. I would encourage you to check them out. But God’s Word is not just a good story. It is alive, it never changes, and it is meant for us today.
First, if you are in a season of uncertainty, do not only look for the big miracle. Choose to see where God is already weaving your story together. I have had a lot of hard things happen to me, but I have never lost a spouse or the person who provided for my family. I would not dare compare my life to Ruth’s. And yet Ruth, having lost her husband and left everything she knew, including the gods of her childhood, is now an example of faith. She trusted that God would take care of her. She did not know it would be through Boaz, or in Boaz’s field. Ruth, a foreigner who did not grow up among God’s people, had the faith to set an example for us today.
Too many times, when life gets messy, we look for the big flashing sign. “God, I want to see Your hand move in this specific way, and then I will know it is You.” “God, if this is really You, I need a miracle.” We do not see that in the book of Ruth. We see provision. We see protection. We see God weaving things together. But it never comes as the big moment we want. If you are like me, looking for the big moment, I would encourage you to reel it back a little. Look around and see how God has already started weaving the pieces together for your protection.
Second, I believe we have a lot of well-intentioned people who say and think great things but never put anything into action. It would have been easy for Boaz to say, “Who is that woman? A foreigner? All right, she can still glean, but that is it.” He would still have been considered a good man. But Boaz saw a need, saw Ruth’s faithfulness, and made plans to meet that need physically.
Boaz does not say, “I will go and pray that God hears your cries.” He does not say, “I will talk to the high priest on your behalf.” That would have been good. It would not have been enough. He says, “Do not go to anyone else’s field. It is too dangerous. Come to mine, any time you need to. Even here, stay close to the other young women. There is safety in numbers. Take as much as you want. And when you are thirsty, go drink the good, clean water my workers have drawn.”
He did not just say, “I will pray for you,” or “I will bring it to the church,” or “I will tell my pastor.” He made plans to help. It is not enough to be kind. It is not enough to be thoughtful. If we want to be like Christ, or like Boaz, who is a picture of Christ in this story, we need to physically do something. Pray for them? Great. Put it on the prayer chain? Great. Bring it to the Wednesday night prayer list? Great. I am not knocking those things. But we cannot stop at prayer. God wants to use us too.
Closing prayer 77:00
Father, thank You for Boaz. Thank You for the story of provision and protection we read in Ruth chapter 2. Thank You that Boaz, in some ways, points forward to You and what You were going to do.
Like Ruth and Naomi, we are in need of provision and protection, especially spiritually. Your Word is clear: if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. It is just as clear that without that, there is eternal separation. Thank You that Jesus came to die on the cross to provide for us and protect us, the way Boaz provided for Ruth and Naomi.
I pray that we would not be people who only have kind thoughts or only offer prayers. Make us people like Boaz, who use the resources You have given us, because they are Yours anyway, for Your kingdom. I do not know anyone in this room who is Boaz wealthy. But You are, God, and when You want something done, You provide a way. Help us not to think only about our own circumstances, but to look for ways to be a blessing to others.
Give us the faith of Ruth, to know that even when things do not look good, we can trust You and You will take care of us. We honor You this morning. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.
Join us this Sunday
We meet Sundays at 9:00 AM at 6320 S. Kings Ranch Rd., Gold Canyon, AZ 85118. If you have never been to church, or have not been in a long time, you are welcome here.